All About Verbs. Introduction. Teach. Apply

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1 All About ] Acting is doing, because everything you say or do is some kind of an action, some kind of a verb. You re always connected to the other person through some kind of action. Mira Sorvino Introduction are the energy sources of sentences. They set their subjects into motion whether a subject is walking or simply being. This minilesson focuses on the following aspects of verbs: verb tenses, including the perfect tense subject-verb agreement irregular verbs descriptive verbs Begin a mini-lesson on verbs by writing a short definition of this part of speech on the board. Here s an example: A verb shows action: The dog howls. A verb also can show a state of being: The dog is wet. Teach Give each student a copy of the passage Volunteer! on page 19. Allow time for students to read the passage on their own or ask them to follow along as you read it aloud. Then use the teaching guide on page 18 discuss how the writer used nouns in the passage. (Also see the lessons on gerunds, participles, and infinitives on pages 41 4 and phrases and clauses on pages 47 52). Grammar Activities That Really Grab Em!, Grades by Sarah Glasscock, Scholastic Teaching Resources Paige pulls a handwritten list out of her jeans pocket and groans. When Antonio doesn t ask what s wrong, she groans again. Antonio slides the list out of Paige s hand. It s okay. There aren t that many things to pick up at the grocery store. I can t read what they are, but there aren t too many of them. We will have finished the shopping by five, in plenty of time for our rehearsal. I can read it, Paige replies as she retrieves the list. I ve shopped for Mr. Gantry for five years. That s not it. What am I going to do for my volunteer project? I can t think of anything! The door of the dry cleaners magically sighs open so magically, that it almost hits Antonio in the nose. When an arm thrusts a plastic-wrapped dress through the open door, Paige automatically hooks the hanger on her index finger. Antonio points his own finger at the dress. Whose dress is that? he asks. I promised Mrs. Li I d pick up her dress. Her great-niece is getting married on Saturday, Paige explains. Help me, Antonio! What am I going to do for my project? My parents and my brother haven t given me any good suggestions at all. Antonio eyes the flowers that Paige has bought to cheer up Abner, her sick neighbor; the plastic-wrapped dress; and the grocery list. Have you ever thought about volunteering to do things for the older people in your neighborhood? he asks. Don t be silly. Paige juggles the flowers and dress as she tries to read the grocery list. That s not volunteering that s just helping out Name Date 1 Apply Distribute the Create a New Word reproducible on page 22 and share the information about sniglets. Ask: Can you see how the words yo-yo and rotate were combined to create the sniglet yotate? Before students attempt to create their own sniglets, remind them to follow the same format as the entry for yotate. Write the dictionary entry for a verb such as swim on the board or on chart paper and display it so students can see the proper format. 17 (YOH-tayte) v. to allow a yo-yo to unwind on its own: a combination of the words yo-yo and rotate. TENSES: Present yotate, Past yotated, Future will yotate. EXAMPLES: Raul yotates four yo-yos at the same time! Wow Raul yotated four yo-yos at the same time! Next, Raul will yotate four yo-yos at the same time! What? You ve never heard of the word yotate? You can t find it in the dictionary? That s because the word yotate is a sniglet a word that doesn t appear in a dictionary, but should. Work with one or two partners to create at least two verb sniglets. Use the format shown above for yotate to present your own verb sniglets. 22 Grammar Activities That Really Grab Em!, Grades by Sarah Glasscock, Scholastic Teaching Resources

2 Verb Tenses We use verb tenses to show time. Action can occur in the past, present, or future. The perfect tense refers to actions completed by a certain time. The perfect tense is formed by combining a present, past, or future auxiliary with the past participle: have walked, had walked, will have walked. To form the past participle, you usually add ed to the verb. 2 The verb phrase will have finished is in the future perfect tense. Paige and Antonio s shopping will have been completed by a certain time in the future. 4 I ve shopped is in the present perfect tense. Point out that the auxiliary verb have has been shortened to help form the contraction I ve. Subject-Verb Agreement A complete sentence needs both a subject and a verb. The subject and verb may be singular or plural but they must always agree with each other. Remind students that they should look carefully at compound subjects and subjects that are separated from the verb by noun phrases to make sure they match the subject and verb correctly. Irregular Regular past-tense verbs are formed by adding ed to the present tense of the verb: construct, constructed. Irregular verbs don t follow this rule. Review the differences between regular and irregular verb forms. Share the fact that many of the irregular verbs in English are very old words. While the rules for forming verb tenses have changed over the years, irregular verbs are still formed using old rules. For instance, the verb drink comes from the Old English word drincan. Its past tense was dranc, and our modern past tense is drank. 5 Although the noun dry cleaners is closest to the verb sighs, it isn t the subject door, a singular noun, is, so the verb has to be singular, too. 7 The subject my parents and my brother is a compound subject. A compound subject joined by the conjunction and takes a plural verb, even if the last subject is singular. 3 The verb reply is an irregular verb. The singular present tense is formed by changing the y to an i and adding es. 8 The verb buy is an irregular verb. Its past participle is bought, not buyed. The singular present perfect of buy is has bought. Descriptive with a lot of muscle make writing more descriptive. Emphasize that using different synonyms for a common action verb such as move makes someone s speech or writing more accurate and interesting and that each synonym affects the action described in the sentence. What is the difference in motion between saunter and scurry? 1 The verb groans shows that Paige is being overly dramatic to get Antonio s attention and sympathy. The verbs in this sentence show that the movement of the person, invisible except for his or her arm, is abrupt and surprises Antonio but Paige seems to be used to the person s behavior. 18

3 MODEL PASSAGE Volunteer! Paige pulls a handwritten list out of her jeans pocket and groans. When Antonio doesn t ask what s wrong, she groans again. Antonio slides the list out of Paige s hand. It s okay. There aren t that many things to pick up at the grocery store. I can t read what they are, but there aren t too many of them. We 1 will have finished the shopping by five, in plenty of time for our rehearsal. 2 I can read it, Paige replies as she retrieves the list. I ve shopped for Mr. Gantry for five 3 4 years. That s not it. What am I going to do for my volunteer project? I can t think of anything! The door of the dry cleaners magically sighs open so magically, that it almost hits Antonio in the nose. When an arm thrusts a plastic-wrapped dress through the open door, Paige automatically hooks the hanger on her index finger. Antonio points his own finger at the dress. Whose dress is that? he asks. I promised Mrs. Li I d pick up her dress. Her great-niece is getting married on Saturday, Paige explains. Help me, Antonio! What am I going to do for my project? My parents and my brother haven t given me any good suggestions at all. Antonio eyes the flowers that Paige has bought to cheer up Abner, her sick neighbor; the plastic-wrapped dress; and the grocery list. Have you ever thought about volunteering to do things for the older people in your neighborhood? he asks Don t be silly. Paige juggles the flowers and dress as she tries to read the grocery list. That s not volunteering that s just helping out. In this passage, you ll explore the following: verb tenses irregular verbs subject-verb agreement descriptive verbs 19

4 $ WRITING PROMPTS Teachers: Duplicate these prompts on sturdy paper and then cut them apart. You may also write the prompts on the board or display them onscreen Name Date Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow Write! Choose one of the prompts below to write about. Pay attention to the verb tense! Think back to when you were in first grade. What is the best thing you remember about being a first grader? Use only the past and past perfect tenses to describe that memory. What is the most interesting thing you re learning right now in school? Why is it so interesting to you? Use only the present and present perfect tenses. What do you think high school will be like? What are you most looking forward to learning when you re in high school? Use only the future and future perfect tenses to predict what will happen. Look at the verbs you used. Did you use the proper tense for each verb and did you use it throughout your response? If you re not sure whether you used the correct tense for a verb, circle it. With the Rest of the Class: Talk about why you chose the prompt. Was writing in that tense easier or more difficult than you thought it might be? $ Name Date Then I Told Abe Lincoln... Write! What if you could step into a time machine? What place would you visit? Would you travel to the past or to the future? What would you experience? What would you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel? Write a story about your adventures. Exchange stories with a partner. Read the story and then think about how the writer used verbs. Did the choice of verbs really help you see the story? Talk about what you liked about the story and ask any questions you have. Write your full response on a separate sheet of paper. Write your full response on a separate sheet of paper. With the Rest of the Class: Read aloud your story to the class. Share how your partner helped you revise your work. 20

5 Activities: Who s Being Disagreeable? Materials: index cards, markers, timer Four people can play this subject-verb agreement game: a host, a contestant, and two panel members. On an index card or the whiteboard, the host writes the complete subject or complete predicate of a sentence, such as one of the following: The leader of the wild dogs... (complete subject)... were skating across the thin ice on the river. (complete predicate) Each panelist writes a complete subject or a complete predicate on an index card or whiteboard to complete the sentence. The complete subject or complete predicate may or may not agree with the host s incomplete sentence. It s up to the contestant to identify which panelist is in agreement. (Both panelists may agree; both panelists may disagree; one may agree, and one may disagree.) Play continues for 10 minutes. The group with the most correct completions is the winner. With the Class: Talk about why nouns such as family and group take singular verbs. Who Are You Calling Irregular? Materials: number cube, dictionary, timer Challenge pairs to see how many regular and irregular verbs they can name. Give the following directions: Take turns tossing the number cube. If you toss an even number, call out a regular verb. If you toss an odd number, call out an irregular verb. (You can have up to 30 seconds to scan the dictionary.) Write down the present- and past-tense forms of each verb in a T-chart. If you have any questions about an answer, look up the verb in the dictionary. With the Class: Discuss how students decided whether a verb was regular or irregular. Pose the following questions: Did any of the verbs fool you? What can you do to remember which verbs are irregular? People on the Move Materials: thesaurus Tell students to take a few minutes to look around and observe the people they see: Who do you see? What are they doing? Then have them write a paragraph describing the actions of one person without using common verbs such as walking, running, driving, playing, dancing, and so on. Encourage students to stretch their verb vocabulary. They may consult a thesaurus for synonyms that will make pictures pop into their reader s mind. Urge them to take chances and think of creative and original ways to use language. With the Class: As students share their descriptions, brainstorm even more verbs. Record them in a Verb Volume, a book that everyone can refer to during writing activities. 21

6 ACTIVITY Name Date Create a New Word yotate (YOH-tayte) v. to allow a yo-yo to unwind on its own: a combination of the words yo-yo and rotate. TENSES: Present yotate, Past yotated, Future will yotate. EXAMPLES: Raul yotates four yo-yos at the same time! Wow Raul yotated four yo-yos at the same time! Next, Raul will yotate four yo-yos at the same time! What? You ve never heard of the word yotate? You can t find it in the dictionary? That s because the word yotate is a sniglet a word that doesn t appear in a dictionary, but should. Work with one or two partners to create at least two verb sniglets. Use the format shown above for yotate to present your own verb sniglets. 22